11 Jul 2024
The specimen direction on circumstantial evidence did not reverse the burden of proof; the appellant's renewed and new grounds were either answered by authority, without merit, or out of time and not reasonably arguable; the conviction and 20‑year sentence are affirmed and two months loss of time is ordered for the unmeritorious appeal conduct.
21 Mar 2024
Leave to appeal was refused because there was no proper evidential basis on the trial evidence to require a self‑defence direction; the Judge correctly instructed on 'unlawful' killing and burden of proof, the summing‑up fairly presented and assessed competing evidence and credibility, and no special inferential direction was required for post‑offence statements which constituted direct evidence of state of mind.
31 Oct 2022
The judge's directions were correct and lawful because the defence consistently ran the case solely on provocation such that murderous intent was not a live issue at trial and there was no sufficient evidential foundation to leave an alternative verdict of unlawful and dangerous act manslaughter to the jury; accordingly the application for leave to appeal and the appeal are dismissed.
1 Apr 2021
Leave to appeal was dismissed because on the evidence and the way the defence was run (an outright denial of possession and no suggestion of self-consumption) simple possession was not an obvious or viable alternative; the judge did not err in omitting a direction on that alternative and the applicant failed to show a departure from accepted norms amounting to substantial and grave injustice.
6 Mar 2017
The application for bail pending appeal is dismissed because the grounds raised do not show a prima facie likelihood of success: the judge correctly treated the CSA and the Listing Rules as relevant matters for the jury to assess; the alleged defects in particulars and directions were matters of fact for the jury or were unlikely to have produced a different outcome; the applicant failed to meet the high threshold for bail pending appeal.
20 Nov 2015
The summing-up was fair and adequate: the judge properly directed the jury to consider all the evidence, dealt appropriately with the hearsay issue, and was not obliged to put a speculative panic defence not supported by evidence; consequently there was no merit in the grounds and leave to appeal against conviction was refused.
9 Nov 2012
The judge's challenged remarks were permissible expressions of opinion and legitimate lines of analysis for the jury in the context of the accused's defence; she had repeatedly reminded the jury that questions of fact and the ultimate decision were for them alone and that they could ignore the judge's views, and therefore the impugned passage did not render the conviction unsafe.
10 Feb 2012
The summing-up was imbalanced and delivered in a prosecutorial manner consisting of a seriatim demolition of the defendant's evidence, coupled with judge's sceptical interventions during cross-examination and absence of direction that lies are not equivalent to guilt, such that the jury was left little option but to reject the defence; the conviction was therefore unsafe and must be set aside with a retrial ordered.
28 Jul 2011
The summing-up and the judge's active questioning crossed the line from legitimate clarification and robust direction into effectively prosecutorial advocacy and invited an adverse inference from the applicant's exercise of his right to silence, rendering the trial unfair; conviction quashed and retrial ordered.
18 Jun 2010
The Court held the summing-up was fair, balanced and contained the appropriate directions about reliability, intoxication, inconsistencies, lack of independent corroboration and recklessness; on that basis the jury could properly convict and the application for leave to appeal against conviction was dismissed as the conviction was not unsafe.